BERKELEY — The braided cornrows, the three visible tattoos and the baggy shorts didn’t help perceptions about Jazmine Perkins.

Instead, they only fueled the opinion that Perkins, a senior guard on the Berkeley High girls basketball team, had an attitude.

Those views weren’t that far off. Perkins did have her moments where she clashed with coaches, players and referees. And, there were times when the senior guard thought her way was the only way.

“I wouldn’t say she had a short fuse. I would say she had a chip on her shoulder,” said Berkeley assistant coach Anna Johnson, who has known Perkins since the sixth grade. “She has always been trying to prove everyone wrong, constantly, every day.”

All the jabs eventually reached Perkins, who went to work and corrected them.

Her evolution is part of the reason Berkeley plays in its third straight Division I state title game against Long Beach Poly at 6 p.m. on Saturday at Sacramento’s Arco Arena.

Perkins heard that she couldn’t shoot. She fixed that, becoming the Yellowjackets’ most consistent outside threat. Despite playing out of position at point guard because of an injury to Dominique Williams-McNac, Perkins averaged 16.1 points in 11 Alameda Contra Costa Athletic League games.

Then she heard she couldn’t play defense. Perkins changed that too, developing into one of Berkeley’s best defenders with a penchant for patrolling the passing lanes.

The last criticism has been the hardest to shake. Despite her success and numbers on the court, her “bad” attitude overshadowed everything she accomplished on the hardwood.

“I started stepping back on how people viewed me, like ‘Oh she has a bad attitude or she has a horrible attitude,'” Perkins said. “Now, I have this thing where I come out on the court and I smile. Nobody wants to have impression that they are a bad person.”

It wasn’t any easy revelation for Perkins to come to terms with. And it wasn’t any easy fix.

The 5-foot-10 Perkins needed 31/2 years to dispel the reputation. It wasn’t until she signed her national letter-of-intent with Washington State in November that Perkins knew she had to change.

“My mind-frame was, I was just going to throw it all away,” Perkins said. “Before I signed, I was like nobody is going to tell me what to do. But I knew that if I have a bad attitude then they won’t want to be around me.”

So, she changed and when the season started she became the Yellowjackets’ leader. She took her younger teammates under her wing and told them what to expect.

She prepared them for playing in a high-profile program that has won two state titles. She prepared them for the post-Gene Nakamura era, in which he helped establish Berkeley as one of the top programs in the state.

She became the Yellowjackets’ vocal leader. Taking charge in practice and games, making sure her teammates were doing everything that was asked of them.

“She just matured,” said Berkeley first-year coach Cheryl Draper, who worked with Nakamura as an assistant for eight seasons. “Her freshman year, she was really scrappy, hyper and impulsive. Now as a senior, she is much calmer. She thinks more before she responds.”

Before the Yellowjackets took the floor for the third straight time in the NorCal championship last Saturday, Perkins gave all her teammates advice.

She told them not to be in awe of the Arco Arena environment and not to look into the crowd — mistakes she made in her previous two trips.

Her words rung with the rest of the Yellowjackets. Berkeley opened the game on a 22-1 run to dispatch Kennedy-Sacramento 72-53 to win its third consecutive NorCal title.

Perkins heeded her own advice and had her best game in a NorCal event with a game-high 28 points, 12 rebounds, three blocks and three steals.

“That was a joy and pleasure watching (Perkins) on that Arco floor,” said Johnson. “I was enjoying the moment, but I was also like wow, she is growing up.

“She has graduated and is ready for the next chapter and new challenges.”

And Perkins can’t wait to tackle those challenges with tattoos, cornrows and baggy shorts in tow. The only thing missing will be the attitude.